At 12:34 PM 5/20/99 , Roberto Gaetano wrote:
>Michael,
>
>The two cuts you provide are not recent news, and have been discussed at
>length since the events, more than six months ago. But since you bring the
>subject up again, let me point out that the two cuts refer to two different
>facts: the initial contacts to all possible candidates, and the final call
>to the chosen nine.
>I thought that this was clear from the context, but since I may be wrong,
>let me point out that, to my understanding, Joe Sims confessed to have
>called the 9 to-be interim Directors (selected by Jon Postel) to tell them
>they were the chosen ones. As you note, he already admitted "his own
>culpability" for this tremendous sin.
Hi Roberto,
Mr. Conrades appears to contradict this.
Here are the applicable sections of the
transcript from the Boston ICANN meeting:
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/icann/cambridge-1198/archive/transintro.html
14 MR. TRIANA:
1 Among the Europeans, as you know, at the
2 beginning there was some research about that, and
3 to understand the necessary transitional period to
4 go from the current situation to the normal one
5 open to competition. And to be asked onto this
6 Board for me has been a very, very honor to be
7 proposed by Joe Sims. Thank you.
22 MR. CONRADES:
2 I got to the ICANN Board by essentially
3 minding my own business. I was riding along in my
4 automobile one day when the phone went off, and
5 John Patrick from the local Internet project and
6 IBM, who knew me from IBM, called and asked if I
7 would consider being on this board. He was
8 calling on behalf of Joe Sims, who was putting a
9 board together to be submitted to the U.S.
10 government. And John felt that my background in
11 both IBM and with ISP and with a (inaudible), but
12 also no longer being part of those firms, would be
13 helpful on the board and said that he thought the
14 job would be quite difficult, intellectually
15 stimulating and highly frustrating. I thought,
16 well, two out of three isn't bad.
13 MR. ROBERTS: Thanks, Esther. I, too,
14 got involved through Joe Sims. In my case, it was
15 in September, and Joe called me to ask me if I
16 would consider being a member and start-up CEO of
17 what has become ICANN.
9 MR. FENELLO: Could the Board please
10 address, how many members were directly or
11 indirectly contacted by Joe Sims for their current
12 position?
13 MS. DYSON: All of us, I believe.
14 Maybe not for you.
15 MR. KRAAIJGNBRINK: No, I was not and
16 Eugenio Triana was not.
17 MS. DYSON: But then you were contacted
18 about the meeting. Yeah, Greg?
19 MR. CREW: Just to clarify, the only
20 contact I had with Joe was a formal question, was
21 I willing to stand. That was the only contact.
22 MR. CONRADES: And I was not formally
23 contacted from Joe. He did not initiate the call
24 to me. The call came through our public affairs
1 office, I think two calls came through our public
2 affairs office, and then I spoke to Joe.
3 MS. DYSON: Okay.
4 MR. NESSON: Might I suggest that Joe
5 is in the room, and at a meeting yesterday, he
6 made a statement which I thought was exceedingly
7 clarifying. And with your permission, Esther, I'd
8 love to invite Joe just to make a statement.
9 MS. DYSON: Okay, here he comes. And
10 then, you know, honestly . . .
11 MR. SIMS: The -- there is posted, I
12 believe, on the IANA Web site or it will be
13 shortly a document which consists of answers to
14 questions that were posed to me by the Science
15 Committee, one of which was, how was this Board
16 selected. So you can read that in more detail,
17 but I will try to repeat, to the best of my
18 ability, what it says in there, which is, in fact,
19 that throughout the summer, John Costello
20 solicited suggestions for people who might serve
21 on the Board. He got suggestions from a very
22 large number of people, ranging from the technical
23 community to the business community to people
24 representing the European Commission and other
1 governments.
2 The -- when we came down to the final
3 process of determining who would be invited to
4 serve on the Board, that decision was made by
5 John. He asked me to contact the people that he
6 thought would be the most appropriate people to
7 serve on the Board. I contacted, I believe, each
8 of the people who are now members of the Board,
9 all of whom, I believe, had been contacted by
10 somebody prior to that time to ask them whether
11 they were interested and would it be okay to
12 submit their names along with probably several
13 hundred other folks. And I sent an E-mail, as I
14 recall, asking would they be willing to serve on
15 this Board. And of the people that I formally
16 asked to serve on this Board, we asked ten people,
17 and nine of them said yes. We did not take all
18 the suggestions from the European Commission or
19 other governments, but we did find some of them to
20 be perfectly appropriate and valuable suggestions,
21 and some of those people now sit on the Board. So
22 that's -- those are the facts.
>Mr. Pickering's question was a different one, though.
>He was interested in who contacted *all the potential candidates* (following
>"advice from a wide range of individuals and groups ..."), and on how the
>selection process was done.
>And to this, Mr. Sims answered explaining the process and saying that he did
>not know who did the first contacts for each of the contacted persons. BTW,
>the number of people contacted has been said to be "fairly large". From what
>I can deduct from the rumors floating around in those days, this number was
>probably higher than 50, and it is perfectly reasonable that Joe Sims did
>not know by heart who contacted whom (also because it was not something that
>could be qualified as "top importance matter"). In fact, I had the
>impression from the transcriptions that this answer sounded reasonable to
>Chairman Pickering as well, but maybe you are aware of something I don't
>know.
>
>Of course, at that time nobody could imagine that, six months later, ....
>;>)
>
>Regards
>Roberto
>
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Michael Sondow [SMTP:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
>> Sent: Thursday, May 20, 1999 6:30 AM
>> To: ICANN
>> Cc: Esther Dyson; Mike Roberts; Paul Twomey; Nikki Vajrabukka; WTO Trade
>> Policy Review Board; George Conrades; Greg Crew; Frank Fitzsimmons; Hans
>> Kraaijenbrink; Professor Jun Marai; Geraldine Capdeboscq; Eugenio Triana;
>> Linda S. Wilson; Joe Sims; Al Gore; Chip Pickering; Connie Morella; Thomas
>> Davis; Gil Gutknecht; Eddie Bernice Johnson; Jim Barcia; Mark Harrington;
>> Richard Russell; Paul Scolese; James Tierney; William Daley; Madeleine
>> Albright; Theresa Amato; James Love; Jay Fenello; Ronda Hauben; Karl
>> Auerbach; Beckwith Burr; Larry Irving; Gordon Cook; Tony Rutkowski; Tom
>> Lowenhaupt; Nick Patience; Jeri Clausing; U.S. Ho. of Reps. Commerce
>> Committee; U.S. Secretary of State; Milton Mueller; Ellen Rony; Ronald
>> Wyden; Jonathan Zittrain; Larry Lessig; Shari Steele; Troy Davis; Erick
>> Iriarte; Eberhard W Lisse; Willie Schatz; Kevin M. Kelly; Hector L.
>> Rodriguez Milla; [EMAIL PROTECTED]; Jeff Graber; Courtney Macavinta;
>> Howard Sartori; Kathryn Kleiman; Barbara Dooley; Bret A. Fausett; Francis
>> Gurry; WTO Media; Lidia Carlos-Silvetti (ERAD); Committee on Trade and
>> Development; Trade and Development Center; WTO Information;
>> [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>> Subject: [IFWP] Joe Sims' confession
>>
>> On November 11, 1998, Joe Sims, attorney to ICANN, confessed to
>> having committed perjury before the elected representatives of the
>> American people, in a written and signed affidavit to the U.S. House
>> of Representatives Committee on Science.
>>
>> This is his statement, written by him in the third person in an
>> attempt to distance himself from his own culpability: "The final
>> decisions on who should be invited to serve as interim At Large
>> Board members were made by Dr. Postel, after receiving comments,
>> suggestions, and advice from a wide range of individuals and groups
>> (not named [ed.]). At his direction, Mr. Sims contacted each of them
>> to invite them to be included in the interim group of At Large Board
>> members to be proposed to the Department of Commerce."
>>
>> The following is a transcription of Joe Sim's testimony, under oath
>> to tell the truth so help him God, to the House of Representatives
>> four weeks prior to that statement:
>>
>> Chairman PICKERING. Going back to who selected the nine interim
>> board members, the nine? Was that something that Mr. Postel or Mr.
>> Magaziner, who called the individuals up and said, "Would you like
>> to serve on this interim board?"
>> Mr. SIMS. I don't think I actually know the answer of who
>> actually made the phone calls.
>> Chairman PICKERING. But this is a key question of accountability
>> and this is a very legitimate issue. And let's just be forthright
>> here. Somebody knows who called the nine members on the board.
>> Mr. SIMS. Oh, sure. Oh, sure. And we could find that out. I just
>> don't personally know because the process was---
>> Chairman PICKERING. Ms. Burr, do you know?
>> Ms. BURR. I know that it was nobody in the U.S. Government that
>> called them up and invited them---
>> Mr. SIMS. Yes, I'm sure---
>> Chairman PICKERING. Does anyone on this panel know who selected
>> the nine members on the board?
>> Mr. SIMS. Well, let me try to describe how the process works, and
>> I think I'll be able to answer your question even though I can't
>> tell you precisely what person called what person. The process, as I
>> said, was a process of trying to gather and create consensus around
>> a group of people. There were are large number of people involved in
>> that process. And, obviously, John Postel was at the center of that
>> process, but he certainly wasn't---he personally I think does not
>> know most of these people. And he certainly was not the person who
>> was suggesting them or coming up with the ideas. The ideas came from
>> all around the world, and then variou people who were able to
>> contact them, were asked to contact them. And that information was
>> then fed back.
>> And, in fact, I think the record would show that those kinds of
>> contacts, "Would you be interested in serving on this board?" were
>> made with a fairly large number of people. And we got a number of
>> "No, thank you, I would not." And we got some, "Yes, I guess I might
>> under some circumstances, tell me more." And then, finally, we got
>> at least this nine people to say yes.
>> If it was a critical piece of information for this Committee, I'm
>> sure with a little due dilligence I could find out exactly who made
>> the phone call. I just don't happen to know it.
>> ..........................
>>
>> This is the man who wrote the ICANN bylaws. This is the man who, in
>> collusion with Jon Postel and Michael Roberts, destroyed the White
>> Paper process and its product, the IFWP. This is the man and these
>> are the people being protected by Beckwith Burr, at the risk of her
>> position and her career.
>
Respectfully,
Jay Fenello
President, Iperdome, Inc.� 404-943-0524
-----------------------------------------------
What's your .per(sm)? http://www.iperdome.com
